I started with Interlock. It seemed logical, since my sons were 5, 3 and 1. Before the end of the year, my husband lost his job. I managed to find someone selling a new Basic Five set and purchased it at a huge savings. Our first year in the Volumes was rocky at times, but enjoyable for the most part.

When I started shopping for a used Volume 2 I decided I could do without the Day by Day. After writing out the lessons plans for the first week I took time to map-out the Wisdom Words objectives for the year.

My first step was to page through the first grade objectives and see how many of them there were. I also needed to know how many of them required multiple days to complete. Once I had this number, I looked at my calendar and figured out how many weeks of school we would have that year. I divided the number of objectives by the number of weeks and came up with a rough idea of how many objectives we needed to do each week to get through the program in one year. If I recall correctly, it came out to be two or three objectives each week.

I chose to do at least three a week, sometimes four. I didn’t want any objectives split over the weekend, and I also wanted it planned out so that we finished WW before we finished the school year. That way, if we fell behind for any reason, I would have time to finish. Now that I’ve been Weaving for awhile, I realize I could have also just kept moving through WW without worrying about stopping. When my child finished the objectives for their grade, I could have moved them up to the next grade and kept teaching.

My children don’t have to “see” the WW pages, so they don’t have to know which grade I’m teaching from. I still have two early elementary children and I’ll probably use the latter method to get them through Wisdom Words.

Last night I purchased an awesome creative writing tool: The Learning Calendar. This morning I signed up for their free newsletter, The Learning Calendar Ideas. The newsletter provides additional activity ideas that correspond to the wall calendar.

The calendars themselves can be reused–although the days of the week won’t be right, the history for that day will never change–just like Weaver. The more calendars you buy, the cheaper they are, so grab some of your homeschooling friends and get a box to share! You can usually buy last year’s calendar at a great discount, too!

“When I give a writing assignment, my child says he doesn’t know what to write, and will just sit there.”

Does this sound like your house? Here are four ideas to help you get your students writing.

1) Try a sentence starter:

• “My mom likes…”
• “The dog is…”
• “Look! It’s a…”
• “On Tuesday we…”

I’m sure you can come up with more like this!

2) Invest in a creative writing book or calendar, or use an Internet site for ideas. I have a book called “Writing Down the Days: 365 Creative Journaling Ideas for Young People“ by Lorraine M. Dalhstrom. A good place to get ideas online is the History Channel. Click on This Day in History for a short article that will give you lots of ideas for writing!

3) Have your child write what he sees. One day I had my child close his eyes and I turned him in a circle a few times. Before he opened his eyes, I instructed him to hold out his arm and point with his finger–he chose how high or how low to point. When he opened his eyes, he was pointing at a gravy boat in the chiina cabinet. I told him he could write whatever he wanted about it: he could write a description of it, or tell how it was probably made, or he could use it in a short story… whatever, just as long as he wrote!

4) When all else fails… Have your child write, “I don’t know what to write” repeatedly on the paper for five minutes. This gets old really fast! My son had to do this three times before he finally started getting creative.

Be sure you are writing with your child. Set an example and your child will soon follow.

A long-time Weaving mom, Corina T., has come up with a special chart for Wisdom Words. This chart shows the topics that are covered in each grade, and when they will be repeated during the course of the program. The chart is a Word document and it’s located within the Files section at Yahoo. It can be found by clicking here. (You may be prompted to log-in, or join the group when you follow this link.) Click on the folder “Wisdom Words,” then right click on the file “WWTopics.doc” and choose to save the link or open it.

If you have a useful chart you’d like to share, let me know!